Bio:

Deborah Carr is Professor and Chair of Sociology at Rutgers University. She has a secondary appointment at the School of Social Work, and is a faculty member at the Institute for Health, Health Care Policy and Aging Research. She earned his Ph.D. in Sociology from the University of Wisconsin in 1997, and her research interests include aging and the life course, psychosocial factors influences on health over the life course, and end-of-life issues.

A second strand of her research focuses on bereavement and end-of-life decision-making among older adults. She is interested in how demographic, technological, and social/political changes affect the experiences of the dying and their families. She is co-editor of Spousal Bereavement in Late Life (2006, Springer Publishing). She is principal investigator on several NIA-funded studies of end-of-life issues, including the New Jersey End of Life study and Wisconsin Study of Families and Loss (WISTFL), a follow up to Wisconsin Longitudinal Study. Her third area of research focuses on the social, psychological, and interpersonal consequences of body weight and obesity.

Carr is a member of the honorary organizations Sociological Research Association and Academy of Behavioral Medicine, and is a Fellow of the Gerontological Society of America. She has served as deputy editor of Social Psychology Quarterly and Journal of Marriage and Family, and as trends editor of Contexts (an American Sociological Association publication). She is editor-in-chief of Journal of Gerontology: Social Sciences (2015-2018). She is also chair of the editorial board of Rutgers University Press. Carr has held several offices for the American Sociological Association sections on Aging & the Life Course, Medical Sociology, Mental Health, and Social Psychology, and is currently chair of the Aging & Life Course section. Carr also is Chair of the Board of Overseers of the General Social Survey, and is a co-investigator on the Midlife Development in the United States (MIDUS) and Wisconsin Longitudinal Study (WLS).

Carr, Deborah, Lauren Murphy, Heather Batson and Kristen W. Springer. 2013. “Bigger Isn’t Always Better: The Effect of Obesity on the Sexual Satisfaction and Behavior of Adult Men in the U.S.” Men and Masculinities16: 452-477.